Adventure #21: There's a Famous Person at the End of this Post

Disclaimer: To anyone who is already intimately aquainted with Philadelphia, this post might prove boring.  But to anyone who, like me, is new, I hope you will enjoy my adventure!  Today I took myself on a mini field trip. I was trying to get to Uhuru flea market in West Philly, but I got confused about how to get to the trolleys after getting off the Broad Street line at City Hall, so I just decided to wander around Center City for the afternoon.  It was gorgeous today - upper 60s and sunny.  What wonderful things might I behold?

First, I found a frozen yogurt place called Yogurt City - the kind of place where you choose what kind(s) of froyo you want and then add all the toppings you want and then get charged based on how much it weighs.  I got the original tart, cheesecake, pomegranate, and cookie dough, and for my toppings chose strawberries, mango, juice balls, cookie dough, and some crunchy chocolate stuff.  Deeeelicious.   

Next I walked over to City Hall and explored.  That building is so cool.  I didn't realize that when you go through the entrance you end up in an outdoor courtyard area.  I'm not an architecture person, but being there, in this historical place with all its unexpected surprises, made me feel very calm and happy.  Here are a few pictures of the building from the courtyard:

 

 

Here are some surprising architectural details and sculptures in the archways:

 



 

There were also two plaques of William Penn's prayer for Philadelphia, written in 1684, which I copied down because I really liked it. 

 

"And thou Philadelphia, the virgin settlement of this province, named before thou wert born, What love, what care, what service and what travail have there been to bring thee forth and preserve thee from such as would abuse and defile thee.  O that thou mayest be kept from the evil that would overwhelm thee, that faithful to the God of thy mercies in the life of righteousness thou mayest be preserved to the end.  My soul prays to God for thee, that thou mayest stand in the day of trial, that thy children may be blest of the Lord, and thy people saved by His power."

I think that maybe we need to start praying this prayer again!

I came out of City Hall and took pictures of the Man on a Horse statue, and of this building across the street:

 

General George B. McClellan

What is this building?

Moving on...I walked across the street and studied this sculpture, called Government of the People.

It had something to do with the family, and government by the people, for the people.  Then I realized that behind it were sculptures of giant game pieces.  You can see them here, along with City Hall from the outside:

 

And here is a statue of a previous mayor of Philadelphia, Frank L. Rizzo.  He was mayor from 1972-1980.

 

I realized then that I was near Love Park.  There was something going on there with lots of young people, but I didn't investigate it much, mostly because I was scared of the shirtless muscular guy in the little pink shorts.  I took these lovely pictures, saw that the Art Museum was nearby, and decided to walk in that direction.

 

 

I think where I was now is called the Parkway.  It is the area where all the museums are.  They are sort of in a circle with a big beautiful fountain in the middle.  The ground around the fountain is loose gravel/dirt/sand, so I felt nostalgic for the beach.

 

 

 







I continued to walk around the circle and realized the the first large building was not a museum, but was the main branch of the Free Library of Philadelphia.

Of course I had to check that out!

I walked over to the library and read the sign out front: today Justin Cronin (who I'd never heard of ) and R.L. Stine were going to be there for a talk, Q&A session, and book signing!  At 2:00! And it was 1:15ish now!

For those of you who did not grow up in the 90s and/or are not as obsessive about children's literature as I am, R.L. Stine is a VERY famous children's book author.  He wrote the Goosebumps series, which has over 40 books and is celebrating its 20th anniversary. Now, I would have been more excited about his being there if I had ever actually read Goosebumps.  However, I was completely terrified to read them as a child, and I believe that still to this day I haven't read any.  I may have to now, though.

So I explored the library for awhile.  It is huge.  When I walked up the stairs, I felt like Belle in Beauty and the Beast.  The children's section was not as impressive - I prefer the children's library in Bloomsburg - but it was still quite nice. 

I went into the auditorium (an auditorium in a library!) just before 2.  It turns out that both Justin Cronin (author of The Passage and The Twelve) and R.L. Stine are hilarious. R.L. Stine read a short story he'd written for children and then talked about his new novel, Red Rain, which is his first attempt at writing for adults.  He decided to write a story for adults because the members of his original fan base are all in their 20s and 30s now and asked, via Twitter, for him to write something for them!  I also found it interesting that he tried writing joke books for children before writing scary stories, and that the reason he started writing scary stories is because a publisher told him she needed a scary story for teenagers.  So he read a bunch of scary stories for teenagers and decided to do something "younger and cuter."  And Goosebumps was born.

My one regret for this day is that I didn't stick around to get my picture taken with R.L. Stine.  Also, I didn't have anything for him to sign.  So I left after the Q&A because I had to get back to my library in South Philly before it closed at 5 (I needed dinosaur books for this week.)  So here is the one terrible, blurry picture I have of R.L. Stine:

 Ah, well.  It was still a great day!